Dr Zubir Ahmed

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Jeremy, and I start by sincerely thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Rand) for securing this debate. I also welcome Mike and his family to the Public Gallery, and pay tribute to Mike for all his efforts. My hon. Friend raises an important issue that can affect so many people—all people perhaps, at some point—about ensuring that when someone is diagnosed with a terminal illness, they can receive the mental and emotional support that they need in the place that they need it. We want to be a society where every person receives high-quality, compassionate and personalised care from diagnosis through to the end of life. The Government are determined to shift more healthcare out of hospitals into the community to ensure that patients receive personalised care in the most appropriate setting. Palliative care and end-of-life care services, including those provided by hospices, have a big role to play in that shift. Palliative care services are included in the list of services that an integrated care board must commission, promoting a more consistent national approach and supporting commissioners to prioritise palliative care and end-of-life care. To support that process, NHS England has published statutory guidance stating that ICBs must work to ensure that there is sufficient provision of care services to meet the needs of their local population. It also includes references to mental health, wellbeing and support for those with palliative care and end-of-life care needs. Of course, there are many examples of voluntary initiatives, such as grief or bereavement cafés, or the Good Grief community, which aims to support people at the end of their life and their families through a programme of events and courses, and the provision of resources that often include pre-bereavement advice and support. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West feels passionately about mental health support for those with palliative care and end-of-life care needs, and that he has been supporting Mike’s campaign for improved mental health services and support. I offer him my deep appreciation, as well as a meeting with the Minister for Care and end-of-life care officials, so that we can engage him around the palliative care and end-of-life care modern service framework that was recently announced, which we hope to publish in the spring. The Government are also transforming the current mental health system, ensuring that people get access to the right care at the right time in the right place. That is why we are increasing our investment in mental health support by £688 million in cash terms. The hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans), who spoke for the official Opposition, talked about impact assessments. I gently say to him, in the context of this convivial and constructive debate, that when we came into office we had an impact assessment by virtue of the Darzi review, which highlighted in stark terms the difficulties that the NHS in its totality is under after 14 years—the difficulties that we inherited. I also point out that our real-terms investment of £26 billion is an increase to the NHS budget that will translate into, among many other things, a new national cancer plan. That will examine not only the process of getting the best treatments to patients, but improving communication, improving pathways, and instilling better and more bespoke mental wellbeing support into some of those pathways.